


Write your letters in the sand

by Ischa



Category: Adam Lambert (Musician), Kris Allen (Musician)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-20
Updated: 2012-09-20
Packaged: 2017-11-14 16:39:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ischa/pseuds/Ischa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Adam has a lot of issues with himself and Kris is awesome. </p><p>  <i>“He is... you, but different. I like hanging out with him. He is awed by me. It's nice.” Kris shrugs,  grinning. </i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Write your letters in the sand

**Author's Note:**

> Title: Queen (39)  
> Beta: the always awesome Curiously Graceful  
> First written as a comment-fic. This is the longer/better version.

~1~  
Kris blinks. He grabs onto the edge of the table and blinks again.  
The kid is still there.

“If you drugged me to have your wicked-” The kid's voice sounds shaky.

“What? No!” Kris interrupts hastily. Kris needs to sit down. He needs to be sitting right the hell now.

The kid looks around; his bottom lip trembles slightly and he bites it, like he’s trying not to look scared.  
Something about him looks _so_ achingly familiar, but Kris just can't pinpoint it. All he can do is stare at the kid’s face, waiting for the penny to drop.

“You don't look like a rapist of underage boys,” the kid says after a while.

“Because I'm not,” Kris answers, trying to stay calm.

The kid shrugs. “You can never tell these things. People are messed up and cruel, but they can look pretty while they're being cruel, too.”

Kris has never been bullied or anything, so he doesn't really know what to say to that, and besides, the kid doesn't look like he wants to talk about it either. Kris has the feeling he's just trying to not freak out. Kris can relate, but he needs answers.  
“So, not to be an asshole, but you are in my living room and the door is locked,” Kris says. And then, because his mama raised him right: “I'm Kris.” This is super awkward, but he has no idea how to start a conversation like this politely.

“Adam. And I have no freaking idea. One minute I'm in my bedroom singing ‘We Will Rock You’ and the next, bam, I'm here, and - you're looking really freaked out now, dude.”

Kris _is_ freaked out, because of fucking course. Everything comes back to Adam. If it were aliens or unicorns Kris wouldn't be less surprised. “Adam,” Kris says.

“Yes?”

“As in Mitchel Lambert. Son of Leila and Eber,” Kris adds, just to be sure. Maybe this is just some kind of weird… something. Kris has no idea how to even finish that sentence.

Adam takes a step back and then another until he hits the couch. “Yeah.” The kid sounds freaked out now too. Well, that makes two of them, Kris thinks.

“I need to call someone, and you, you need to sit down, I think.”

“Are you alright?” Adam asks.

“Yes, of course,” Kris says. Adam, he thinks, can't be older than sixteen, and he’s worrying about Kris. And if sixteen-year-old Adam is here, Kris really needs to check up on _his_ Adam. Now Adam, what-the-heck-ever Adam.

Kris grabs his phone. “There's ice-cream in the freezer,” he says.

Adam makes a face. “No thanks.”

Kris laughs. “Don't even pretend you don't want it. You are stressing over this ,” Kris says, because anyone would be. Adam always wants ice-cream when he's stressed out.

“What kind?” the kid asks, with barely concealed interest.

“Caramel-nuts, something… something. I don't know. Tastes pretty good, though.”

“A spoonful maybe,” Adam allows.

Kris smiles. “Be my guest.”

~+~  
“Slow down, Kris.”

“How in the name of god could I ever slow down now, Adam? You are here in my living room. Well, in my kitchen by now, eating ice-cream and oh, yeah: sixteen.” Kris sounds pretty freaked out about all this, Adam thinks. To be honest, he is too. He’s just trying to project calm and 'the universe makes sense, even though you are telling me about a past self sitting on your couch' thoughts through the phone. He doesn't think it’s working.

“I’m not even on the same continent right now, Kris.” But how he wishes he were.

“I checked. His name is Adam Mitchel Lambert. He is the son of Leila and Eber, and he is maybe sixteen. I didn't ask.” Kris sounds a bit distracted by that fact, but then Kris would be. Kris probably asked his name like that too.

“I'll be back home in three days.”

“Adam,” Kris says, taking a deep breath. Adam can hear it on his end of the line. “What are you doing in my living room?”

“I am not home, maybe that's why my… I have no idea what to even call him and I am only believing this because it's you and you sound freaked out, Kris-”

“I _am_ freaked out,” Kris interrupts.

Adam ignores him. They've been over this already and Adam doesn't have all the time in the world right now to talk it over, even if he wants to tell everyone else to fuck off so he can book a flight back. “The best place for me at that age would be with you, you know?”

Kris sighs. “He can stay here, but… is he from your past or a parallel universe or what?”

“Are you asking me if I knew you at sixteen?”

“I guess?”

Adam can't remember randomly time-hopping at that age, or at any other age for that matter. “No. I met you for the first time on Idol.”

“Parallel universe it is then. I can work with that.”

“How is that better than my past-self?” Adam wants to know.

“Well, you don't need to be his future, you know? But you could be. So if it's a parallel universe kind of thing, I won't mess him up by telling him stuff or by introducing him to you. Because he’s not you, but he could be from a parallel universe where he might grow up to be you, could grow up to be you. You know?”

Somewhere in there Kris lost Adam completely. “No, but it doesn't matter. You won't be alone with this. I'll skip my post-tour shit and come to you as soon as I can. Deal?”

“Yeah,” Kris answers, and he sounds relieved.

~+~  
 _Adam has no idea what the hell is going on, but that Kris guy seemed way more freaked about his name than about Adam actually being in his living room at all. Adam wonders what that's all about. He takes another spoonful of ice-cream. It really is good; Kris didn't lie. But then Adam didn't think he would. He didn’t seem the type._  
 _Adam looks around the kitchen: it's small and neat and kinda boring. So he walks back into the living room, ice-cream and spoon still in hand. He needed that. Ice-cream did make the world a better place, even if he would regret eating it soon enough._  
 _Kris puts the phone aside and looks at Adam. No one has ever looked at Adam like this. He feels his face heat up and hides behind the ice-cream carton._

_“You're staying here for now. Until we figure out what to do,” Kris says._

_Adam nods and mumbles something that could be okay, or whatever._

_Kris gives him a look. “Wanna watch a movie?”_

_Adam nods again. He is less freaked out than just half an hour ago. Kris pats the couch beside him, and Adam walks over to sit.  
To be honest, he isn't in any hurry to get back home. There is nothing there, except Neil and their parents and school hell, day in and day out._

 

~2~  
“So, you live alone here?” Adam asks the next day over breakfast. He still looks a bit rumpled from sleep. Kris thinks it's adorable. All these freckles! Unhidden. In bright daylight for everyone to see.

“Yeah,” Kris answers, pouring coffee into mugs and shoving one at Adam.  
Adam, Kris thinks, is - surprisingly or not - already cool at the tender age of sixteen. He talks a mile a minute about music and performing and nail-polish. Not that Kris can say much about the last, but he's good with the rest.

“Thanks. No girlfriend?”

“No, not anymore,” Kris answers. He doesn't want to talk about his divorce with a sixteen-year-old kid. That wouldn't be fun for anyone. It's still too fresh anyway, and tabloid fodder on top of everything. That's why he's been hiding out in his home in the first place.

“Well, at least there’s no one to complain about you leaving shit around.”

That startles a laugh out of Kris. This _is_ Adam. Another version, a younger version, but still Adam. Maybe a bit more cautious, a little more bitter underneath, but still Adam. “Your mom does that a lot, hmm? Mine used to do it too.”

“Every mom does that. But look at you. All cleaned up,” Adam teases, and this is so familiar.

Kris shakes his head. He could've been friends with this kid. He would have liked this kid. “She's proud that I’m able to look after myself.”

“I bet she's all: they grow up so fast...” Adam says taking a sip of his coffee.

Kris smiles over the rim of his mug. “Yeah, sometimes.”

“So, what are you doing for a living that makes her proud?” Adam asks. They hadn’t covered that the day before, because at some point Kris had made Adam go to bed. He’d been looking rather exhausted.

“Music. I write music, I play music, I record music.”

Adam looks at him: his eyes all wide and interested. But then, of course Adam would be. “Can I hear some songs?”

“Sure,” Kris answers, because there is no way he could say no to Adam anyway. No matter which version of him.

“Awesome.”

~+~  
Adam lets his bag fall onto the floor of Kris’ entry hall and leaves his shoes there too. The rest of his stuff has been sent ahead to his own house and has hopefully arrived there by now.  
He throws his jacket over Kris’ sofa and heads to the kitchen where the soft laugher is coming from.

And then he just stands there in the doorway, watching Kris joking around with a boy that looks like the unloved version of himself that he'd rather forget. They're totally absorbed in each other. The kitchen smells like cookies.

“These are awesome,” the Ginger says (it isn't nice to call that boy that, but Adam has no love left for his younger self. And besides, no one can hear him think).

“Almond and chocolate chip; they're Adam's favourite,” Kris answers, shoving another one at the Ginger.

“They are,” Adam says, because he has had enough of this. Usually Kris can smell him when he's in the freaking hall or whatever. And now he’s been standing here for whole three minutes being ignored.

“Adam!” Kris grins and nearly breaks his neck as he rounds the table and face-plants into Adam's chest.  
Adam spares a glance for the kid before he just hugs the living hell out of Kris.  
He's missed Kris; of all people, he'll always miss Kris the most. It's just a fact of Adam's life. He doesn't dwell on it.  
“I thought you'd be back tonight, earliest,” Kris mumbles into his shirt.

“Well, you said it was a crisis. And now I find you here baking,” Adam answers.

Kris makes a noise against his chest and Adam's arms tighten around him. Sometimes it's really hard to let Kris go.

“We got by,” the Ginger throws in.

Adam ignores him. “So, can I get coffee with the sugar rush?” he asks Kris.

“Sure, in a minute, okay?” Kris says.

Adam really doesn't mind. At all.  
The Ginger, on the other hand, does. Adam can see it from the corner of his eye, in the way he holds himself. Adam remembers seeing it in the mirror when he was younger, for what feels like a million times. He drops a kiss on Kris’ hair, inhaling his scent.

Eventually Kris lets go and looks up at Adam. “You look skinny.”

“You're such a sweet-talker, Allen.”

“My mama raised me right.” Kris shrugs, “but you know I don't mean it in a complimentary way.”

“You made a batch of cookies. I'll eat half of them and-”

“Don't even finish. You'll still look good,” Kris says.

Adam smiles at him. It's hard not to. “You are my favourite person.”

Kris bounces on his heels and then lets go completely, stepping back. He turns to the kitchen-table and then kind of freezes like he just remembered the kid.

“So, this is Adam,” he says. Adam isn't sure whether he’s saying it to the Ginger or to Adam himself. This is getting confusing.

~+~  
 _Adam knew that there were people in Kris’ life, but he didn't think that there were gorgeous people in Kris’ life. Kris doesn't seem the type to be friends with the likes of this rockstar guy.  
He watches as they hug and his fingers curl into fists on the table. There are a million things between Kris and rockstar guy, and he, he can't touch them. He thinks that no one can. They seem to just fit; even the stupid hug makes them look like they are one person, or whatever. It's hard to look away, though. _

_Adam wonders if one day he’ll have someone like Kris. For real, not just borrowed; because rockstar guy makes it perfectly clear that Kris belongs to him. Adam swallows and then takes a sip of water, so he doesn't start to cry. He is too old to cry like that._

 

~3~  
“We need to come up with another name for him,” Adam says.

Kris looks at him. The other Adam is in bed and Kris is tired, of course, but he needs to talk this over with Adam. Without the kid. “Adam is his name,” Kris says, defensively.

“But it's confusing, Kris. I always just assume that you're talking to me.” Adam sounds like he wants to throw up his hands, Kris thinks, and it shouldn't be funny, but it kinda is.

“I am, in a way,” Kris says. He has to admit that this is confusing, of course, but how freakish must it be for young Adam?

Adam exhales noisily – it could be called a huff.

“You don't like him being here,” Kris realises.

Adam shrugs. “It's freakish.”

Yes, but that isn't it – there’s more. Kris knows Adam. Kris knows Adam like he only knows himself (and maybe Katy, once upon a time). “No, it’s more than that. It’s because he’s you at sixteen .”

Adam makes another one of these noises that tells Kris he's irritated, but doesn't really want to admit it. “Let's call him Mitchel, then?”

“How about I call you Lambert, and we let the kid have his name. You have everything right now and he…” Kris stops. “You hated being that kid, and he reminds you of that feeling. That's it, isn't it?”

Adam gets up. Kris is this close to following him, but Adam's being really freaking scary right now.  
It's never a good thing when Adam removes himself from someone's personal space. He’s never done it to Kris before, but Kris has seen it happen.

“I _am_ that kid,” Adam says, and he isn't looking at Kris. He sounds bitter. “When I see him, I can taste it on the back of my tongue. Under all that make-up and glitter, that's who I am.”

“Yes,” Kris answers, and Adam looks sharply at him like Kris has just betrayed him.

Adam, Kris realises, doesn't get it. “Adam,” he says softly. “That kid, that kid that you hate so much; that kid is awesome. I love that kid. And he's going to grow up to be you. Don't you see? Don't you see how wonderful he is, how special you were? How special you _are_?”

~+~  
Adam leans his head against the wall. Of course Kris would think that. Kris doesn't care about how chubby Adam was, or how his freckles made his face look so… _hideous_ , about how his hair was a mess, a horrible, unruly style that only ever looked attractive on girls. Kris… well, he sees Adam's _soul_. The character and talent and spark that was already there back then.

“And Adam?” Kris asks.

“Yeah?”

“Have you seen his eyes?”

Adam hasn’t. Well, he has, but he doesn't think people stare at their eyes all day in the mirror or anything, to really look at them. He shakes his head.

“They are beautiful and fierce, and show people everything he feels – everything you felt – if he wants them to.”

“You really do like that kid,” Adam says. He shouldn't be surprised to find that out, but he is.

“Yes! He's funny and sarcastic and smart. And he can talk about nail-polish for one hour 47 minutes straight.”

“You checked the time?”

“I was curious,” Kris admits with a shrug.

“Must have been a handful.”

“He is... you, but different. I like hanging out with him. He is awed by me. It's nice.” Kris shrugs, grinning.

“I am awed by you, Kris Allen,” Adam answers, and it's the fucking truth. Sometimes it hurts, but right now it doesn't. Kris makes Adam feel like he's better than he really is, like he could be better still, and the truth is he really wants to be. Kris makes Adam feel like he is all the things he always pretends to be. It's petty to try and take this away from his younger self just because he has a ton of issues.

“He wants to dye his hair. You gonna help him?” Kris asks.

“After breakfast tomorrow,” Adam says, and Kris smiles at him like he's proud.

~+~  
 _”So, you want to dye your hair?” the rockstar asks._

_Adam has no idea why he thinks that's his business, but he nods anyway. Adam is not looking at the rockstar directly, he watches him in the mirror. The rockstar leans casually against the door-frame. Adam isn't going to pretend he doesn't want to look like that when he's... well, older. So someone like Kris can fall in love with him._

_“Want some help?”_

_Adam raises an eyebrow._

_“I’m a pale ginger underneath all this,” the rockstar says with a smile._

_Hard to believe, Adam thinks. “Okay.”  
The rockstar steps closer. He is so close Adam can feel his body-heat, and it's weird, but oh man, this guy smells really good. He wants to bury his noise in his shirt – no wonder Kris clings to him while they hug. The rockstar stares at him and then touches his jaw and turns his head gently so they can look at each other properly. He cocks his head. Adam swallows. _

_“You know,” he says, “Kris is right. You have the most amazing eyes.” He leans forward a bit and somehow – and Adam has no idea how, he swears to god – Adam meets him halfway and - “Oh,” the rockstar says and then he pulls away and Adam's lips feel cold in the absence of warm, smooth rockstar lips._

_“I-” Adam starts._

_“No big deal,” the rockstar says, but he lets go of Adam's face. “So, what colour?”_

_“Black,” Adam says, reaching out and then-_

_He's standing in front of the mirror in his bedroom, and wasn't he just singing ‘We Will Rock You’? Why is he in the middle of ‘We Are The Champions’?  
He closes his mouth and looks at himself hard. He should dye his hair, he thinks. Black._


End file.
